NEWS: Duncan Riley Leaves TechCrunch

We Lost A Blogging Giant Today: Duncan Riley Leaves TechCrunch

from TechCrunch by Michael Arrington

Today was Duncan Riley’s last day at TechCrunch, and he will be greatly missed.

Duncan joined us exactly one year ago and was our most prolific writer, covering tech and startup news seven days a week. He is the author of our highest trafficked post ever, and, based on TechMeme headline counts, he is the fourth most important tech blogger on the Internet (by the way, current or former TechCrunch writers take 4 of the top 5 spots). He is a giant among us, someone who’s fought in the trenches with me through some very trying times, and he will be greatly missed.

So why is he leaving? To compete with us, of course. 

Duncan will shortly announce the launch of Inquisitr, a blog covering the stuff that he is passionate about: pop culture, tech stories and various oddities that he thinks people will find interesting. You can subscribe to Inquisitr in your feed reader via this URL. You can also read Duncan’s personal blog here.

The list of former TechCrunch writers grows longer. Duncan joins ex-TechCrunchers Nick Gonzalez (now at Social Media), Marshall Kirkpatrick (now at ReadWriteWeb), Natali Del Conte (now at CNET TV) and Ben Meyer (now at Facebook) who’ve left us over the years. All of them remain good friends, and I have every reason to believe Duncan will as well.

You may see the odd story from Duncan here on TechCrunch from time to time for old times sake. But to get your daily dose of his always smart, sometimes crazy ramblings, make sure to bookmarkInquisitr. My sincere hope is to have the opportunity to buy that blog some day and bring him right back into the fold.

Matt Craven at Blog Herald interviewed Duncan about his change in jobs, listen here.

Duncan Riley talks about His Experience with TechCrunch and Future Directions

from ProBlogger Blog Tips by Darren Rowse

Good interview over at BlogHerald with Duncan Riley who today finishes up as a blogger at TechCrunch.

The ground covered in the interview is great listening - from how he landed the TechCrunch job, to what it’s like to dealing with the email on such a position, to dealing with trolls in the TC comments, to work/life balance, to working with video, to what he’s doing next (starting a new website at The Inquisitir)… and more.

All in all I found it to be a really interesting interview. I found the first half better than the 2nd - but it was all good.

We Lost A Blogging Giant Today: Duncan Riley Leaves TechCrunch (Michael Arrington/TechCrunch)

...Duncan Riley Leaves TechCrunch  —  Today was Duncan Riley's last day at TechCrunch, and he will be greatly missed.  —  Duncan joined us exactly one year ago and was our most prolific writer, covering tech and startup news seven days a week. Techmeme

Ed: How does a publisher retain talent when content and circulation tools are free; and advertising sales can be outsourced? Are readers loyal to the publication or the author? With RSS readers that aggregate rivers of content, do we distinguish the publication from the author?